How exactly does one go about following up a series of four concept albums on each of the elements, one of which was a loose adaptation of Moby Dick and the last three of which have sold in excess of 100,000 copies? If you’re Mastodon, it means letting loose and generally fucking around a bunch for that archetypal back-to-basics record, of course. Even as the term has devolved into little more than a trite press release buzzword in recent years, employed by everyone from Kylie Minogue, Metallica and a 30-years-washed-up Zombies to imply a big, shocking departure/return to form, it isn’t unheard of for an act to revert to their old ways for their best work in years.

In many ways though, The Hunter is very much a back-to-basics album, Mastodon’s most forward-thinking record yet that reprises the punchy force and (relatively) short track lengths of their 2004 opus Leviathan, while retaining many of the increasingly divergent qualities they’ve picked up along the way to album number five. Not that they’ve been around long enough to warrant cries for a return to form – and few wouldn’t argue that their last two records have been their best – but freed from the confines of elements and concept albums, Mastodon sounds fresher than ever. Single “The Curl of the Burl” opens to Brent Hinds’ snarl of “I killed a man ’cause he killed my goat, I put my hands around his throat!”, while the brutal “Bedazzled Fingernails” offers up another hilarious reminder that metal too can have a sense of humor (the band has previously scored Jonah Hex and written songs for the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie). – Consequence of Sound